


The Summer Palace...an addendum

by NoBaggage



Category: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat
Genre: I need to let them go, M/M, Soft Boys, These boys invented love, Toothache sweet, inspired by a song, post The Summer Palace
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-07
Updated: 2018-11-07
Packaged: 2019-08-20 04:43:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16549130
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NoBaggage/pseuds/NoBaggage
Summary: I saw the film,Boy Erased,and heard the Troye Sivan / Jónsi track,Revelation,played over the credits. The film made me long for a world like the one C.S. Pacat created, where love between same sex people is simply accepted. Plus the song was SO SOFT and it sent me into this daydream / one-shot of Damen and Laurent, moments after the end of The Summer Palace. Because I seem incapable of letting them go.





	The Summer Palace...an addendum

On hearing footsteps and the clatter of refreshments at the entrance to their chambers, Damen, in defiant modesty, clutched a sheet over his half-hard arousal. Laurent’s cheek dimpled on one side. Servants came forward to place a heavy pewter tray between them on the enormous bed. It was laden with fruits and soft cheese, flatbreads and cured meats.

They were ravenous.

It felt decadent to eat in bed, languorous, but a necessary intermission to their intent for the remainder of the day.

Damen and Laurent stretched out, side-by-side against the cool curve of marble. Damen turned, his eyes casting up and down from Laurent’s face to his elegant fine-boned feet. Now that they were alone again, he tossed the sheet away from his body. He chewed lasciviously, a pursed lipped smile. His look telegraphed to his lover that nourishment would only slake one hunger. Laurent flushed, and then returned the look with interest.

When he had eaten his fill, Damen held a ripe slice of peach in silent offering to Laurent. The act felt like heroism, akin to any Damen had used on a battlefield. He waited, unsure whether Laurent was ready for this type of light-hearted bed play, still half expecting an acid tongued rebuke. His heartbeat picked up when Laurent’s eyes darkened and his mouth softened.

Laurent allowed Damen to slide the fruit back and forth along his bottom lip. When Damen pulled back, Laurent’s tongue slowly tasted the path of the peach, his eyes never leaving Damen’s. Breathing became more noticeable. These subtle moments between them were charged. If Damen had experienced anything in his past that was more erotic, he didn’t remember it. He didn’t want to.

After the second anointing of the peach, Damen couldn’t stop himself. He pushed the fruit into Laurent’s mouth and leaned forward to taste it for himself. The kiss deepened, sweet and tender. On a hair’s breadth the kiss turned wanton, and they became lost in it. Laurent clambered to straddle Damen’s lap, pressing against him, hot and hard. His foot kicked backwards, sending the tray of food flying. It clanged, the noise reverberating, echoing like a gong on the marble floor. Neither of them paid it any heed.

For hours, this cycle continued. Between lulls in their ardour, they remained intertwined, heartbeats slowing and sweat cooling their bodies, before they drifted into periods of light sleep. 

Damen woke once to find their faces close, sharing breath. After Laurent’s silent and powerful offering earlier that day in the baths, something seismic had changed between them. Before today Damen had only felt free to touch Laurent as he wished when they were in the throes of passion. Now, as they lay sated and quiet, he was at ease to cup Laurent’s cheek, to glide his fingers through the fox fur softness of his hair. He thrilled when Laurent returned his touches, tracing his own fingertips over Damen’s features, twisting one of Damen’s curls around a finger.

Shadows in the room lengthened and darkened. When night fell, velvet and dark, blossoms in the gardens below released heady scents that drifted into the chamber on the cool breeze. Thick candles in enormous glass lanterns flickered as the wax melted and pooled. The light was dim so that colour was indiscernible but it was strong enough to read the truth in each other’s eyes.

The words welled up inside him before he could stop himself. They were words he’d never uttered to anyone, not even Jokaste. “Laurent,” he began and swallowed. His throat closed over, he needed a moment, he was too overwhelmed, the moment too important.

Laurent kissed his lips, a soft, open mouth press. “Damen. I know.” He kissed him again, sincere and artless. Then he drew back slightly and gazed over Damen's shoulder, his eyes far away. “For so long I was driven, focused on kingdom and retribution. I shut myself away from...personal feelings. I wasn't sure I could open myself to them again." He blinked and focused back on Damen's eyes. Damen's blood thrummed under his skin. Laurent said, "I was terrified of what was happening between us. I didn't recognise it.” Laurent’s arms were twinned around Damen’s neck. He exhaled, long and slow. “But it cannot be denied. I love you also.” Damen felt pieces inside himself break apart with joy.

Of course Laurent would be the first to say it.

Damen was experienced in bed play. He had shared just about every intimacy that could be shared between men and women or men with men. But laying quiet with Laurent like this, he knew. Intimate touch had never before been like this. With Laurent intimacy was arousing but it also bestowed such a sense of...home. Laurent was his home.

Later, Laurent returned to fastidious form, leaving the bed to procure soft cloths and a shallow bowl of water to clean their bodies from the repeated marks of lovemaking and sweat. So greedy were they for each other, so delighted in this newly achieved freedom of intimacy, that even the task of washing stirred new urges. A few strokes of a damp cloth across naked skin, and they were aflame. Again.

At last, exhausted, Laurent fell into a deep slumber. He lay on his stomach, a cool foot curled around Damen’s calf. Laurent’s head rested on crossed arms, his face only partly visible, much of it covered by a tumble of pale, tousled hair.

Damen, still energised, couldn’t sleep.

He lay on his side, watching the rise and fall of Laurent’s slow breaths and marvelled anew that he had this. They had this. That Laurent _wanted_ this as much as he.

He remembered, Ravenel, holding Laurent in his arms that first time and knowing it could only be once. He recalled his full body agony, being willing to sacrifice everything, his birthright, for the chance of more, and knowing it to be hopeless. Through mad schemes, honour and luck, somehow they ended up having it all, committed to each other for life.

Damen risked a touch. He moved Laurent’s hair away from his face, traced his lips. Laurent didn’t stir.

Damen’s large brown hand drifted across the fine, pale skin, touching the shoulder closest to him and sliding across to the other.

Laurent’s skin pebbled at the touch, but he was so deeply asleep that he still didn’t respond otherwise.

Emboldened, Damen let his hand trace a path, painstakingly slow, down each bump of Laurent’s spine, cupping his curves, the tops of his thighs, and back. Again. And again. There was a mark, a small, circular bruise on the back of Laurent’s thigh and Damen flushed with memory and slight embarrassment at his almost territorial pride. He had marked him with teeth and mouth.

Damen would never take for granted the trust that Laurent had bestowed upon him, to see him so relaxed, his guard, those walls he had built around himself, all totally down. Defenceless yet at ease. It had been a hard won honour; a slow growing awareness of their true selves revealed to each other. Damen would treasure it all his days.

*

Not even remotely asleep, Laurent’s body sung at the gentle touches Damen was offering to every exposed piece of his skin. To acknowledge his awareness might break the intimacy of the moment, and he didn't dare. It took every part of his monumental self-control for him not to react, not to purr out loud. This was already more happiness than he had ever expected or hoped for himself. But he was determined. Now that he had tasted happiness he longed for more. If threatened he would inveigle, scheme or connive to protect Damen, their kingdoms and their future, for as long as they both should live. And Laurent intended for them to live till they were old, fat and grey.


End file.
